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Comparative Politics and Government

Notes suppressed ethnic groups are expressing their identities and demanding equal treatment.
Development of education and communication skills may encourage a flourishing of literature in
a local language whose previous tradition has been informal and oral. This development can
further intensify awareness of common symbols and history. While resurgence of distinctive local
cultures enriches the global society, clashes between cultures and subcultures can also be particularly
deadly bases of political conflict. Moreover, the migration of peoples into new areas, made possible
by easier transportation and encouraged by wars, political conflicts, and the desire for economic
betterment, can seem to threaten the way of life of the host society. The exposure to values from
other cultures may intensify one’s own self-image, which may increase cultural tensions. Although
such exposure may eventually lead to greater tolerance, there is no guarantee of this outcome.
In the last decade the major new development is the trend toward democracy in Eastern Europe,
East Asia, and other parts of the developing world. This democratization trend reflects long-term
responses to modernity as well as immediate reactions to current events. Modernization gradually
eroded the legitimacy of nondemocratic ideologies, while the development of citizens’ skills and
political resources made their claim to equal participation in policy-making (at least indirectly)
more plausible. Thus many studies of political culture in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet
Union uncovered surprising support for democratic norms and processes among the citizenry as
the new democratic system formed.
Ironically, as democratic values have begun to take root in Eastern Europe, citizens in many
Western democracies have become increasingly skeptical about politicians and political institutions.
In 1964, three-quarters of Americans said they trusted the government; today only a third of the
public say as much—and the malaise is spreading to Western Europe and Japan. Recent research
shows that citizen support for democratic norms has not waned; in fact, democratic norms and
values have strengthened over time as democracy has developed in the West. Instead, people are
critical about how democracy functions. Western citizens expect democracy to fulfill its ideals and
are critical of politicians and political parties when they fall short of these ideals. Although this
cynicism is a strain on democratic politicians, it presses democracy to continue to improve and
adapt, which is ultimately democracy’s greatest strength.
Another cultural trend in recent years has been a shift toward marketization—that is, a greater
public acceptance of free markets and private profit incentives, rather than a government-managed
economy. The movement appeared in the United States and many Western European nations in
the 1980s, where economies had experienced serious problems of inefficiency and economic
stagnation. Margaret Thatcher in Britain and Ronald Reagan in the United States rode to power on
waves of public support for reducing the scale of government. Public opinion surveys show that
people in these nations feel that government had grown too large. The political victories of Reagan
and Thatcher gave further prestige to efforts to roll back government involvement.
Just as Western Europeans began to question the government’s role in the economy, the political
changes in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union added a new feature to the discussion. The
command economies of Eastern Europe were almost exclusively controlled by state corporations
and government agencies. The government set both wages and prices and directed the economy.
Today, the collapse of these systems raises new questions about public support for marketization.
Public opinion surveys generally find that Eastern Europeans support a capitalist market system.
Support for market economies has also apparently grown in the developing world. In the past
decade, many developing nations had difficulties in modernizing their economies through
government-controlled economic development; this made freer markets a plausible alternative.
The successes of the Asian “tigers” of South Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore in achieving rapid
economic growth encouraged this movement, which has even affected policy directions in the
People’s Republic of China. It is difficult to disentangle the fundamental political economy issues
here from the effects of contemporary events. The trend toward marketization is a response to a
long period of increased government intervention in economies. At the moment, no particular
mixture of free market and government intervention seems ideal. We expect much further
experimentation; the current trend to marketization may also encounter reversals or countertrends
in the future.

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